


Ordinary Light

by MilkyMint



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Established Relationship, Fluff, M/M, Set in Episodes 159-160 | Scottish Safehouse Period (The Magnus Archives), elias do not interact, post ep 159
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-01
Updated: 2020-01-01
Packaged: 2021-02-27 08:08:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,170
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22073788
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MilkyMint/pseuds/MilkyMint
Summary: Despite plenty of baggage, and an uncertain future, Jon and Martin try very hard to have a nice day.
Relationships: Martin Blackwood/Jonathan Sims
Comments: 8
Kudos: 85





	Ordinary Light

Jon wakes when he can no longer breath.

For one terrible moment he is sure that he is back in the buried, that everything since then was just one more cruel joke. Then his mind catches up, and he realizes that he’s not being constricted by earth pushing in on all sides, but by Martin holding him so tight that it’s getting painful.  
Jon manages to wriggle one arm free and turns the small reading that’s clipped onto the headboard on. Martin winces at the light, but his face doesn't lose the contortion of terror, and when Jon places his hand on Martin's cheek he finds it covered in sweat.  
“Martin." he says, forcing himself to stay calm but firm. Panicking isn't going to do any good.

"Hey. Wake up, Martin. Hey!”  
The final shout wakes Martin up with a start, he stares down at Jon, quickly looks around the small bedroom, then back at Jon.  
“Is this real?” he asks, tensing up even more.  
“I hope so. Can you let go a bit?”  
The pressure eases and Jon can see the panic set in again.  
”Oh my God, did I hurt you?”  
“Just woke me up” Jon lies quickly. “Are you okay? Are you feeling-” ‘lonely’ he doesn’t say, despite everything it would sound foolish, while he’s lying on top of Martin in their a-bit-too-narrow-for-two-people bed, with Martin’s arms still wrapped around him.Not that that would actually stop the Lonely. Being irrational doesn't make it any less real.  
But Martin, fully awake now, lightly shakes his head.

“No I think this was just, you know. Regular old nightmare. It didn’t really make sense, I was back in my old apartment and the worms were squirming down from the ceiling and dropping out of the wall, and they didn’t attack me but they just kept coming, and she was still knocking at my door, and I thought I was going to, to just drown in them.”  
Jon reaches up with his other hand, gently cups Martin's face.

“Hey, it’s okay you're here, you're safe.”  
But Martin is staring at the ceiling with quiet intensity.

“I mean. Fucking Prentiss!” he finally exclaims, all fear washed away by frustration. "You’d think I’d be over that by now. I’ve had so much worse stuff happen to me!”  
“I don’t think that’s how trauma works.”  
Martin sighs. “Yeah, that would be too easy.”  
He lets go of Jon and shifts to sit on the side of the bed.

“What time is it?”  
“Around 5, I think.”  
“Right, I’ll just get up then. You?”

Jon didn't fall asleep until three, and he’s not sure if he needs to sleep anymore, but that’s an experiment he’s reluctant do for no reason.

“I’ll get some more sleep." he answers.

"That is if you’re okay on your own?” He reaches over and squeezes Martin's hand.  
Martin smiles and squeezes back, but replies:“ Yeah, I'll be fine. I'll get something to read. And I promise I’ll wake you up if I’m…if I need some company, okay? ” He raises their joint hands to press a featherlight kiss on Jon's knuckles, and Jon's brain crashes.  
He just stares at Martin, fumbling for words, or a reaction, something that would be right. Maybe he could blame it on being sleep deprived, but that would be a lie.  
“Too much?” Martin asks, with concern tingeing his words. Jon remembers that he is actually capable of talking.  
“No! I don’t know, no what I mean, yes I know it’s nice. I just. What do I do with that?”  
Martin’s smile is fond and lovely and almost believably innocent.  
“I think you just have to accept it.””… I can do that.“  
Smiling all the way, Martin pads out of the room and closes the door behind him.  
Jon rolls over and tries to go to sleep without the comfort of Martin’s warmth around him or the beat of Martin’s heart in his ears. He has enough time to marvel at how fast an unimaginable novelty turned into the natural way of things, before he dozes off.

  
  


When he wakes up again, it’s just past nine.  
Jon walks into the kitchen, and finds Martin sitting there in his sleep t-shirt and sweatpants, a spoon full of cereal in one hand and an old paperback in the other.  
It’s a snapshot of a life so utterly mundane, there must be thousands of scenes like it happening every day, and Jon is paralyzed with love.

“Jon? Is something wrong?” Martin asks, spoon raised in midair.

“No. Nothing is wrong. I’m just… Really glad you’re here.”  
He walks over, wraps his arms around Martin's shoulders, and rests his head in Martin's hair.  
They stay like this for a moment, until Martin clears his throat and says:”Now what do I do with that?”  
Jon chuckles and let’s go.

“You'll just have to accept it.”  
“I can do that. There's tea in the thermos.”

“Perfect, thank you.”  
As he grabs the hot mug his right hand starts itching again. Jon doesn't want to think of Jude Perry and her ilk, not if he can avoid it. He still fears that this tiny seed of happiness he has allowed himself will be like chum to them. But it’s probably just a coincidence. Probably.

*  
“They are coming right back in! I’m telling you, they are evil little spies,” Jon insists from behind the couch where, he'll insist if questioned, was totally planning on standing anyway, this has nothing to do at all with the brown spider sitting on the wall over the fireplace.  
Martin knows better than to tease him about it. He is prepared for these incidents by now, there are glasses and notepads strategically placed around the cottage. He grabs the set from the living room and valiantly steps in front of his boyfriend.  
But he can’t help it.  
“They aren’t evil. And they are not coming back in. This is a perfectly normal amount of spiders for a scotish autumn. Sometimes a spider is just a spider, Jon.”  
Jon makes a disbelieving noise and a strategic retreat into the kitchen, and Martin advances towards the wall, glass raised.  
The spider, once trapped, looks fat, and happy, and mundane.  
“I got it” he calls to the kitchen, where he can hear Jon demonstratively clanking pots around.  
“Well, get it out.”

  
It’s a bright autumn afternoon, the sky a brilliant white and blue, with intense sunlight tricking you into thinking you might get away with just a t-shirt. The wind dispels that notion quickly, but it's still serene.  
Martin enjoys the moment of tranquility before crouching down and squinting into the glass.  
“You really are just a spider, right? Don’t tell Jon, but I actually have no idea what’s normal for Scotland. So, if you are part of the evil spider council or something, you have to appreciate me saving your life. And if you’re not then- Well then I’m talking to a spider with no ears to hear me with. Either way, you owe me for this.”  
He interprets the complete lack of a reaction as agreement, and when the glass is lifted the spider scurries towards the fence.  
The window behind him creaks and he gets hit with a wave of aroma.  
“Yeah you better run!” he calls after the small shape he's already lost track of in the tall grass surrounding the safe house.  
Then he turns, and acts surprised to see Jon standing in the window, shrouded in steam.  
“I think it got the message.” he says with his face as serious as he can manage given the situation.  
Jon looks skeptical.  
“Right. You really missed your calling as a a mafia enforcer.”  
Then there's a shift, and there's a look in Jon’s eyes, like he’s trying to solve a particularly hard equation. It’s a look Martin has quickly learned to read, and he moves just a tiny bit closer so that when Jon reaches the conclusion that leaning out of the window and kissing Martin would be a good idea, he doesn’t have to lean very far.  
Kissing Jon (or being kissed by Jon, shouldn’t it be kissing with anyway? They definitely do it together. Something to think about next time he's writing) is still new and a bit strange and wonderful.  
There's always a bit of hesitation, like Jon is trying to figure out  
where to place himself, his hands, his lips.  
Martin doesn't know if it's because what they have is still new, all things considered, or if it's just how Jon is, but he gets excited at the thought that he'll have the opportunity to find out.  
Jon breaks it of with a sudden “oh” and disappears back inside.  
Martin leans through the window and finds Jon frantically stirring something in the big pot on the small stove.  
“Smells good.”  
“I’m just frying the kumquats.”  
“… That’s a lie.” Martin says with a conviction he isn’t quite feeling, and gets a rare grin in return.  
“You’re getting better. I’m making goulash.”  
“Well, I’m making use of the nice weather. Take a walk.”  
There's a hiss and another cloud of steam as Jon pours red wine into the pot, before he turns back to Martin.  
“Are you going to the village today?”  
“Hadn’t really planned on it, but I could. Do you need anything?”  
“I could use some chili flakes. If they got them.”  
“Sure, I’ll check. Hand me my coat?”

  
*  
Jon watches Martin until he disappears behind a bend in the road and feels the urge to follow, to watch over, to just watch.  
He pushes it down and turns to the much more productive task of cutting peppers.  
It took him a few tries to get back into cooking. Years of only bothering to cook for others, and then the last few years of bothering with food less and less have left him rusty.  
His first attempt when they got to the safe house was a horrible stew consisting mostly of overcooked carrots and raw potatoes. Martin ate two mouthfuls in supportive determination before Jon lunged over the table and wrestled the spoon out of his hand.  
Today he is playing it safe, a goulash recipe he learned and perfected for the rare occasions he couldn't get out of potluck obligations.  
It’s mostly just chopping things and letting them simmer, and he could probably do it in his sleep.  
The downside is that once he has the pot on low heat, there’s a few pieces of washing up to do, and then it’s just four to six hours of waiting with occasional stirring.  
He walks around the house for a bit, but there is literary nothing to do. The living room is clean, after they spent two days cleaning and sneezing from the thick layer of dust on everything. There’s plenty of wood in the basket near the fireplace, and plenty of sand in the bucket next to that. He's already memorized the manual for the emergency generator. The bathroom is utilitarian, but pristine. He makes the bed, and that buys him two minutes of time well spent.  
Wandering through the rooms, he can't help but think that there’s something off about the safe house, probably because that’s what it is. It’s a house ready to be lived in, but it feels almost fake. Like a doll house scaled up and furnished with care. The pictures on the walls are of landscapes and flowers, perfectly free of personality. No photos of distinct places or people, no knick-knacks on the mantelpiece, no signs of a person actually living here.  
He wonders what Daisy would have changed if she had the opportunity.  
Jon sighs, checks in on the goulash, and goes back into the living room.  
At least there is a full bookshelf. It’s filled with a mix of paperbacks that mostly resembles the charity shop selection he remembers from childhood, although there is a disproportionate amount of Highland Romance novels. Daisy's little joke, no doubt, a promise of questionable interior design choices yet to come.  
He pulls a book out at random, a cozy murder mystery by an author he's never read, that caused a stir when it was first published 1926 and it turned out the narrator had been the murderer all along. Ah. He drops it on the side table by the sofa.

But it is a beautiful day, so Jon gets an apple from the kitchen and carefully cuts it open for inspection. Normal apple, no teeth, no spiders, no meat. He's not sure what he would do with anything sinister, but he simply can't bring himself to take a bite out of a full apple anymore.  
He takes his halves outside, to the bench on the south side of the cottage that catches the afternoon sunshine.  
His gaze wanders as he chews, over the almost offensively postcard ready landscape, all rolling hills with white dots of sheep. Both hills and sheep refuse to do anything novel.  
The people who live here must do something for fun. Jon is aware he has no right to be judgemental, none of the interests he picked up, consumed, dissected, and discarded ever got close to being cool. But people can't just be shepherds and farmers, can't they?

  
Maybe he could take up gardening.  
It’s not a hobby he ever considered, he'd had some houseplants over the years, but he'd always forget watering them, or fertilizing them, or just plain forget them. But it seems right, here and now. Of course 'now’ won’t last for long enough to really get anything growing, and he’s not sure about the 'here’ either. He has been thinking about alternatives, but he hasn’t got any better options at hand. Or any, of he’s being honest.  
And he’s not sure if he could make Martin leave what he’s described as 'quaint’ and 'rustic’ without the justification of an immediate threat.  
Jon walks over to the fence surrounding the house.  
He takes one of the apple seeds and pushes it into the damp soil. Probably too late in the year anyway. But who knows. And maybe right here and now, it is the planting that matters.

  
  


*

  
Martin is glad to find that he enjoys long walks. He’d had a suspicion that maybe he just liked the idea of them, specifically because it was unlikely he’d ever have the time to try. Like world travel, or mountain climbing. Well, not mountain climbing. That one he is fairly certain he only likes the aesthetic of, he’s fine sticking to documentaries.  
It helps that they've had luck with the weather, and that the countryside is as beautiful as promised in late night tourism ads.  
Even in autumn the grass is vibrant, there's a gurgling stream right next to the small unpaved road, and the trees are shining in brilliant golden orange hues. Martin pauses more than once to just take it all in.  
Aside from the occasional tractor there’s no traffic, and aside from the nods of the occasional tractor driver there’s no interaction.

  
But the landscape is stillvery much alive. There's birds competing in volume and melody, more than one rabbit dashes away when he gets too close, and Martin is pretty sure he sees a badger disappear in the undergrowth at a cluster of trees.  
The sheep are ever present and nice, picturesque even, but they do not compare to the cows.  
Martin has found four fields with small herds on them so far, his favorite is the one with the highland cows on the road into town.  
They are big and fluffy, and he knows, and reminds himself every few minutes, that they are large animals to be treated with respect, and climbing over a wall to pet some animals that don’t know him would be as stupid in Scotland as it would be at the zoo.  
His willpower isn't tested though, the cows aren’t near the road today. He can see something brown in the distance, but he isn’t sure if that’s a cow standing very still, or a tree stump. He lingers at the wall for a few minutes, willing the speck to move. But it doesn’t, so he files it as 'stump’ and moves on.

He doesn't mind the long stretches of solitude. There’s a difference between being alone and being lonely, and mostly he can tell. But he makes certain to keep the photo ID he swiped from Jon in his coat. Just to be safe.

Martin is aware that he’s become a bit of a figure of interest in the village. Tourist season is over, and being around for longer than a week has made people suspicious he’s moved in without properly informing the town elders.  
The man at the post office is too professional to ask, the staff at the grocery store is too polite.  
The old woman who corners him as he leaves the store is neither.

  
“You’re the one who moved into Hill House.” It’s not a question, and it’s not quite an accusation. Martin recognizes the opening move of a seasoned investigator. She's looking like a grandmother designed by a committee to sell canned soup, but there's a hunger in her eyes that can't be hidden by woolly cardigans or sensible shoes.  
He quickly runs through his options.  
He’s already smiled at her politely, so pretending he didn’t hear her is out. He could be rude. Theoretically.

  
Deflection it is.  
“Oh, is that the official name?" he asks brightly.  
"Well, it belonged to the Hills, before they moved away. But it’s been empty for so long now. Did you buy it?”  
Her glare is piercing now, she definitely realized that he tried to dodge the question. It's not powered by anything supernatural, the only power at work is that of a small town gossip.

  
Martin wants to vanish. He hasn’t tried that since left London, and he’s not sure if he could, and even if he could that would be a bad idea. There’s no guarantee that coming back would be easy or even possible at this point. But his interactions with people have either been with professionally uninterested people at work, or with Jon, who is a different category altogether.  
He can feel the fog pulling at him, he doesn’t want to be here, doesn’t want to be scrutinized, doesn’t want to be judged, doesn’t want to be anything. He wants to disappear.  
Instead, he curls a hand around the small container of chili in his pocket. The chili that Jon asked him to pick up, because Jon is waiting for him at home.

  
“We’re more of, uhm, on an extended holiday I guess.” He finally manages to say.  
“I’m Martin, by the way.” he gives her his best smile, and holds out his unoccupied hand.  
She takes it, smiles politely, and introduces herself as Therese. Martin thinks he might just get away, but she doesn't let go before firing her next volley.  
“What about the other man?”

“Oh, that's Jon. He’s uhhhhhh, he’s a bit of a recluse to be honest, but he’s nice when you get to know him.”  
She finally lets go of his hand.

“I'm sure he is, my Arthur is the same way” she says with understanding, before returning to the role of prime Inquisitor.  
“So how long will you be staying?”

“I don’t know.” Martin answers truthfully. “The house belongs to a friend, and...” and that's when he realizes the vague truth has carried him as far as it's back can bear. He lowers his voice to a conspiratory whisper.

“Well I really shouldn't be telling you this, but work is a bit… Complicated right now. Bit of a scandal back in London, lots of upset people. Nothing illegal or dangerous mind you, but it's better if we just lie low for a few weeks. Let things calm down. I'm sure you understand.”

He's satisfied with the glint in her eyes, it is the joy of someone who is too busy filling in the blanks to pay much attention to the truth. He raises his voice to a normal level.  
“But it’s really nice here, I’d like to stay for a while.”

“And what is your work?” She eyes him up and down with renewed suspicion.“You’re not one of those you tubers, are you?"  
Martin has to laugh, the sheer absurdity of being confronted with YouTube in what he thinks of as a charmingly timeless place is too much.

“No, no no, no, absolutely not. We both work in publishing. But it’s a strictly written and spoken word household.”  
She considers him for another long moment before her face softens considerably.

“That’s allright then! Only we get them here sometimes, and they always get lost because they’re not looking where they’re going and can’t read a map and without their phones they are helpless.”  
Martin nods in a way he hopes conveys that he of course knows how to read a map.  
“Well, it was nice getting to know you, but I better get going, dinner’s waiting.”

“Must be nice.” she grumbles, but dismisses him with a regal nod.

There. He just had a normal conversation with a nice old lady. Well. A conversation with an old lady. Well. An interrogation by an old lady.  
But it’s got to count as practice.

  
Within two days, the rumor mill has turned his few snippets of information into a full fledged soap opera, featuring a torrid affair, a disgraced novelist (Martin isn’t sure whether that’s supposed to be him or Jon), a dramatic burning of all those uppity London bridges, and an elopement to Scotland. It's hard to judge, but Martin thinks they approve.

*  
Dinner is nice, the goulash is hot and spicy, the perfect meal for a day that's turning cold once the sun is set.

They don't talk about anything important. Jon mentions his thoughts on the books at hand, Martin describes the way the little stream next to the road sounds really lovely.  
They speculate who in the village will first brave the climb up the hill to get some new scraps of gossip. Jon thinks they should get their cover story straight before it comes to that, Martin thinks it'll be more fun to see what people make up by themselves.

  
Martin insists on washing the dishes, so Jon gets the fire going. He's extremely grateful to Daisy for printing out an instruction, with pictures, on how to build a proper fire. She really prepped this place to be viable even for someone who has never been camping.

He hears Martin enter and pick a book from the shelf, before sprawling out on the couch.  
Jon places another log in the fireplace, picks up his book from the side table, and settles on the other side of the couch, entangling his legs with Martin's.  
Martin looks up ad smiles at him, but the smile drops once he gets a good look at the cover of the book.  
“Wait, that's what you're reading? Agatha Christie? I thought you said it was by an author you hadn't read before.”  
Jon winces and wishes he hadn't made the decision to not lie to Martin unless it was absolutely avoidable.  
“And I haven't. I know it's almost statistically impossible, but I never got any of her books somehow. And when I was seventeen it became kind of a....a point of pride for a while. I thought having read pretty much anything but one of the best selling authors of all time would make me seem aloof and non conformative.”  
“Oh my god!”  
“Yeah.”  
Jon desperately tries to think of a change of subject, but Martin is looking at him like he's just handed him a beautifully wrapped present and Jon has a terrible, but refreshingly mundane, premonition.

“You are not going to keep that to yourself, are you?”  
Martin looks genuinly sorry as he says: “I really wish I cold promise you that, Jon. But it's so good!”  
He closes his eyes for a moment, then looks back at Jon with determination.  
“Okay, how about this: When I was sixteen, I had a fake clip-in nose piercing.”  
Jon considers this, then nods solemnly.  
“Mutually assured destruction. I like it. Thank you, Martin.”

They sit silent for a while, the only sound from the crackling fire or the occasional turned page. Until Martin speaks up, in a tone that makes it clear this has been nagging at him.  
“But this is like, one of the famous ones. The one where the-”  
“Yes, I know,” Jon interrupts him. “I know.”  
“Oh.Right. Sorry?”  
“No, it's fine. I'm...I'm trying to just enjoy the journey.”  
He makes sure to keep his face toward the fire, they are having a nice and light evening, there's no need to get dramatic.  
But Martin puts a hand on his knee, and murmurs “Yeah, me too.” and Jon is sure that right here and now they perfectly understand each other.

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!  
> The title refers to thesong "Tummy in the Blood" by The Yellow Dress.For me, it's about reaching for a happy life even if it's hard sometimes, and screw anything that tries to keep that from you.


End file.
